DraftKings: Thanksgiving Slate

It’s Thanksgiving, meaning it’s a day filled with family, food, and football. Today we have a small three-game slate featuring the Bears, Lions, Redskins, Cowboys, Falcons, and Saints. It’ll be a day without some key players such as Mitch Trubisky, Alex Smith, and Kerryon Johnson, leaving us with plenty of value plays. The key to this week is picking the right plays and I’m here to hopefully steer you in the right direction. I’m going to break this slate down by position starting with the quarterbacks.

Quarterbacks

Let me start out by stating the over/under for these games. The late game between the New Orleans Saints and Atlanta Falcons is at 61 points while the next closest is the Bears Lions game with an over/under of 43.5 points. The Redskins Cowboys game is projected to have the least amount of points scored with an over/under at 41 points. With that being said, Drew Brees and Matt Ryan should be the top two quarterbacks on this slate. Drew Brees is my favorite quarterback, as he’s thrown for 11 touchdowns in the last three games and has been extremely efficient. He’s not getting near the pass attempts that Matt Ryan is getting, but Brees has made the most of his opportunities.

If you’re looking for value at the quarterback, Colt McCoy and Chase Daniel come in extremely cheap. The problem is McCoy is going against a stingy Dallas defense and we haven’t seen much out of Daniel. You may need to go with one of these players depending on what positional players you decide to choose.

Running backs

Ezekiel Elliott has had a pair of great games. He has had 273 rushing yards, 115 receiving yards, and three touchdowns over the last two weeks. This week he will go up against one of the better run defenses in the league, the Washington Redskins. I advise to have exposure to him in GPP’s but stay away in cash games because there are a couple other options I like better. Alvin Kamara is my favorite running back on the small slate. The Falcons are extremely giving to opposing running backs, especially pass-catching backs.

In the first matchup between the two teams, Kamara had 16 rush attempts and was targeted a season high 20 times. Don’t expect this a second time around with Ingram back on the team, but I still expect Kamara to the rush attempts as a RB1 with about five targets. This volume makes me want to lean heavily on Kamara.

Teammate, Mark Ingram is also a bargain being priced at $6,100. Ingram has back to back 100 yard games with three touchdowns during that time. Some of Chase Daniel’s easiest passes will be dump off passes to the running back, making Tarik Cohen one of my favorite plays. Cohen has only one game this season with double digit rush attempts but is more involved in the passing game. With Kerryon Johnson out this week, LeGarrette Blount and Theo Riddick will get more snaps. If I’m the Lions, I’m not pounding the ball into that Bears defense. Theo Riddick should be the better play of the two, as I’d expect the Lions to be playing from behind. But if the Lions are on the goal line, Blount will be getting the often more often than not. Either way, I like Riddick as a value play at $4,500.

Wide Receivers

Kenny Golladay is a must play. With Golden Tate traded away and Marvin Jones, the Lions will heavily rely on Golladay in the pass game. He’s been targeted 27 times the last two weeks and will continue to be a problem this week.

If the Saints get off to an early lead, we could see a reduced role from Michael Thomas, like we saw last week, with four receptions. However, he managed to still find the end zone. I like Julio Jones more this week. Jones has five straight games with 100+ receiving yards and has found the end zone in the last three. I like both Thomas and Jones this week but if I had to choose one it’s Jones (BUT DON’T FADE MICHAEL THOMAS). Tre’Quan Smith has listed questionable earlier in the week but it looks like he will be ready. He had a strong performance last week with 10 receptions and 157 yards. We’ve seen he has the capability of having 30 point performances so Smith could help bring down a GPP. However, you may have to find more value here after taking Golladay and Jones/Thomas. Trey Quinn will play slot for the Washington Redskins. He ran 36 routes for the Redskins in Week 11. At $3,500 I think Quinn will be one of the chalkier value plays of the week but will allow you to pay up at other positions.

Tight Ends

There’s not much to choose from here. Jordan Reed has consistently had the most targets but we’ve seen weeks where Austin Hooper has 9+ targets. If I had to rank tight ends for this slate it goes Reed, Hooper, Burton. I’m not picking any others from the bunch.

Defense

The Chicago Bears are the best defense available, but I don’t blame you if you want to try and pick on Colt McCoy or Chase Daniel. Personally, I’ll have the Bears in nearly all my lineups.